WILMINGTON, MA — Many members of the Wilmington school community — students, parents, teachers and administrators — have long expressed concern about the district’s current school start times.
Superintendent Dr. Glenn Brand and the School Committee hear and share these concerns.
“The current start times at our secondary schools are considered by many as extremely early and at odds with what research identifies as appropriate for young adolescent students,” said Brand. “There is also a wide spread of start and end times across the district which are problematic for a number of reasons, including transportation and professional development.”
Brand also noted that, from an athletics perspective, Wilmington is falling out of step with its Middlesex Valley League counterparts. Many schools in the league have already made changes to their high school start times, including Arlington (8am), Burlington (8:35am), Melrose (8:15am), Watertown (8:30am), and Winchester (8:30am).
At last week’s meeting, the School Committee unanimously approved the creation of a Start Time Committee. The Committee’s focus will be three-fold:
- RESEARCH & EDUCATION: Gather information regarding the contemporary research around start times and insight into surrounding school districts that have made changes to their times. This area will also articulate the key issues and considerations connected with changing school start times.
- COMMUNICATIONS & OUTREACH: Disseminate information and progress of the committee that will include planning, developing, and overseeing the committee’s outreach which will gather feedback, opinions, and perspectives regarding options developed.
- SCENARIO & OPTION DEVELOPMENT: Work closely with the transportation department and bus company to develop start time scenarios and options district-wide.
The Committee will consist of the following individuals:
- 2 high school students
- 6 parents/guardians — 2 high school, 2 middle school, and 2 elementary
- 6 staff members — 2 high school, 2 middle school, and 2 elementary
- 2 School Committee members
- 2 School Building Administrators
- 2 Central Office Leadership Team members
- Athletic Director
- CARES Program Coordinator
Invitations to Start Time Committee members will be sent in September. The Committee will be finalized in October, with the names presented at the October 25 School Committee. According to Dr. Brand’s proposed timeline, the Start Time Committee will begin meeting in October, present a mid-year report to the School Committee at its February 26 meeting, and deliver its final report to the School Committee at its May 13 meeting.
The School Committee would then conduct outreach to the community regarding different start time options from June 2020 through September 2020. After listening to community feedback, the School Committee will approve its preferred start time option in October 2020, with it slated to go into effect for the 2021-2022 school year, beginning in August 2021.
“I think this is a very smart way to go about it. You’re making sure to include a lot of the different stakeholders. I think that’s really important,” commented School Committee member Jay Samaha. “This is going to have a huge impact on the community.”
“This is going to be ambitious work. I think it’s appropriate that we need more than a year time frame to work on this, not just for budgetary reasons, but this is something that people are going to care about,” agreed School Committee member David Ragsdale. “This is going to affect [parents and guardians] on a daily basis and how they make their transportation and childcare arrangements. There’s going to be a lot of interest and concern on this. It’s important that we get buy-in from the community on any plan we put forth. We need to proceed deliberately with a lot of public input and communication.”
“This is looking at start times district-wide, not just the high school and middle school,” noted Ragsdale. “Everything affects everything else — from the transportation and busing and traffic and so forth. This is looking top to bottom at eight schools and how we’re getting all the students there at what time and how all the pieces interact with each other. This is going to be quite a project.”
Running concurrently to this process, the School Committee will also be conducting a review of its student transportation policy. Jay Samaha and MJ Byrnes will lead those efforts.
“While this policy outlines specific parameters around distance from school and the provision of student transportation, it is timely to conduct a review of this policy now for two reasons,” explained Dr. Brand. “We are not always following this policy closely, mainly due to parent/guardian safety concerns; and (2) the policy has not been reviewed or revisited for apparently quite awhile.”
“Clearly identifying the distances for each grade level will be vital to appropriately developing new bus routing scenarios,” stressed Dr. Brand.
The review will be completed by this December to complement the work of the Start Time Committee.
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